With so much talk about the actions of one US soldier, I’d like to remind you of the qualities most US military members exemplify… Raymond Lester Landtroop was a 23-year-old pilot flying his 10th combat mission. As he came out of the clouds, his plane nearly collided with a British squadron and went into a steep dive. It was plummeting so fast, the wings should’ve fallen off. The bailout alarm sounded, and the nosegunner already had his feet out the doors. But Landtroop said, stay with the plane! He was a quiet man, so when he spoke like that, his crew listened. He miraculously pulled out of the dive, and saved the plane, its crew, and the mission. He lived on to fly 31 missions, and win the Distinguished Flying Cross, three Bronze Stars and the Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters. Last month, Raymond Landtroop died in Irving, Texas. He was 93. That nearly-lethal dive took place 70 years ago today, over Normandy. Just one of tens of thousands of stories of heroism on D-Day.
Posted on: Fri, 06 Jun 2014 20:30:00 +0000
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